MINUTES
FACULTY SENATE COMMITTEE ON UNIVERSITY PLANNING
October 6, 2005
3:30 PM K-State Union Room 205
Present: Burns, Kearns, Oberst, Schumm, Simon, Spears, Stadtlander and Willbrant
Absent: Behnke, Gormely, Hassan, Peters, Rowlett, Rys, and Yahnke
I.
Walter Schumm, Chair, called the meeting to order at 3:35 p.m.
II.
The minutes of September 15, 2005 were approved as written
III.
Announcements
Faculty Senate Leadership As chair of FSCOUP, Schumm has been appointed as faculty senate representative to the Advisory Campus
Development and Planning Committee. He passed out a handout listing committee members and what the
committee’s purpose is. They work with long term campus planning.
A memo was sent out by email from the Provost describing guidelines for Faculty Members regarding
student conduct in instructional settings and in online courses and discussions. The document is available on
the Provost’s web site at: http://www.k-state.edu/provost/policies/studentconduct.htm. The guidelines also
include a suggested statement for inclusion in a course syllabus. This statement can also be assessed at:
http://www.k-state.edu/provost/policies/course.htm.
Schumm discussed the TABOR amendment. He passed out an editorial written by Donna Shank, Chair of
the Kansas Board of Regents, which can be found at the bottom of the Kansas Board of Regents website:
http://kansasregents.org. Just click on the link “What is Tabor”. He also passed out a document with regard
to TABOR written by David Bradley, from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, entitled “A State of
Decline: What a TABOR would mean for Kansas”.
Schumm informed the committee about export control regulations. He passed out a document entitled “An
Overview of KSU’s Proposed Compliance Program”. Export control laws implemented both by the
Department of Commerce through its Export Administration Regulations (EAR) and the Department of State
through its International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR), have been existence for more than twenty
years. Institutions of higher education and their employees are required to comply with these laws and
regulations. Criminal sanctions (including money and/or prison sentences for individuals) can apply in the
case of violations. For more information on KSU’s Export Control Program, please visit the following
website: http://www.k-state.edu/research/comply/ecp/index.htm.
Schumm also informed the committee of a World War II memorial that is being discussed.
IV.
Old Business
A. Parking Garage
The understanding is that the administration wants to go ahead with the parking garage and present the
proposal to the Board of Regents in order to get approval for the bonds. This would be despite apparent
faculty disapproval. Parking fees being raised in order to pay for the garage was briefly discussed.
Discussion came up surrounding how involved faculty senate can or cannot be. It was felt that
administration is going to do this whether or not faculty approve. However, their viewpoint is to get
approval by the Board of Regents in order to get the bonds. Then, if for some reason in the future, the
bonds were not used, we would go from there. A lengthy discussion surrounding this garage and other
future options followed.
B. Strategic Planning
No report at this time. This is an ongoing process within each of the colleges.
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C. Summer Health Insurance
Schumm talked to Human Resources regarding summer health insurance costs. As we had heard before,
the response was that during the summer, if a faculty member has a grant, the part of health insurance that
the university usually pays for is paid by the grant and it should be budgeted in. If there is further concern
about this subject, it can be brought up again in the future. Schumm checked with KSU’s Human
Resources and they indicated that the health insurance costs were prorated over the entire summer,
regardless of whether the faculty member was supported for the whole summer or for only part of the
summer.
D. Study Abroad
Schumm deferred to Spears. Spears commented that Faculty Affairs met on Tuesday and a list was given
of options faculty will have in the future for study abroad programs. The policy they are working on will
have multiple options for faculty to select if and when a course is approved. That proposal will come to
the Executive committee in October, and if approved, it will be on the Faculty Senate agenda in November.
V.
New Business
Stadtlander commented on a recent article in the Chronicle of Higher Education regarding building
maintenance, but he didn’t have a hard copy of it. Kearns mentioned he can search on the Library website
for the article. If he finds it he will bring copies of it back to the committee.
It was mentioned that university committee interaction needs to be stronger and more faculty presence and
feedback needs to happen. The Faculty Senate Leadership Council is working on this.
Spears commented on the drop in enrollment for the university despite College of Education being able to
increase their enrollment numbers. On a whole we were short approximately 400 students this year. Due to
various reasons, including the increase in our tuition, some students are opting to go to community colleges.
Schumm noted that tuition is lower, book rentals are often included free with tuition, and class sizes are often
restricted to no more than 20 students, at some community colleges, including Highland’s Wamego campus,
creating serious competition for prospective freshmen/sophomore level students.
VI.
For the Good of the University. No report.
VII.
Meeting was adjourned at 4:45 p.m.
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